


Like Thunder

by ArcticLucie



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: First Kiss, Fluff, Kissing in the Rain, M/M, Thunderstorms, prison era
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-07
Updated: 2015-09-07
Packaged: 2018-04-19 15:55:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 790
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4752230
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArcticLucie/pseuds/ArcticLucie
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A kiss in a thunderstorm.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Like Thunder

**Author's Note:**

> Because I needed some fluff to balance out my burst of smut.
> 
> Inspired by something I liked on tumblr and also, unsurprisingly, by MermaidSheenaz, because even on her vacation, she feeds my Rickyl muse and we should all make sacrifices upon her alter...or something less creepy. :D Enjoy!

His legs were starting to burn, lactic acid building up in his muscles as he willed them forward one excruciating step at a time. He had to get to Rick, had to find him, needed to know he was safe, need to know…needed _him_ to know the truth before it was too late.

There was a pretty substantial horde coming in behind him and he had to find the leader before they rolled through. The walkers seemed to bring with them the threat of a downpour, the clouds billowing and twisting together shades of ugly greys overhead and the thunder was rumbling low in the distance as if its own horde of timpanists were converging on them from the other side.

He leapt over a fallen tree and sidestepped a particularly thorny looking bush. His arm snagged on part of it, but the pain didn’t register with all the adrenaline coursing through him, heart pumping blood and much needed oxygen throughout his system.

The walkers were coming in fast, but he had speed on his side at the moment. He knew that would change when his stamina waned. He’d have to find a place to hide after that, but not without Rick. He was going to find him no matter what the cost to himself.

A crackle of lightning almost blinded him. He stumbled on a loose rock and nearly rolled his ankle, but he caught himself before he could go down thankful he was able to straighten himself up and soldier on. There was just no other choice.

His crossbow hung heavy at his side. It would’ve been easier to run with it strapped to his back, but he couldn’t take that risk; he needed it to be ready to fire at a _second’s_ notice. One arm was tired from aiding his momentum, the other from being weighed down by the bow.

The trees were thick as he weaved around them, but suddenly, they gave way and his feet hit sand. The difference in substrate had him lurching forward again as they adjusted to the looser composite underfoot, but they didn’t stop, _he_ couldn’t stop. Not when he saw Rick standing by the shoreline.

He picked up speed the closer he got and crashed into him just as the sky began to break, thick droplets falling down like a million glittery diamonds from heaven when he soldered his lips to Rick’s. The man must’ve been utterly shocked, gasping into the kiss. Daryl would forever choose to believe that instead of knocking the wind out of him, he simply took his breath away.

Because just when he thought Rick would push him away, drive a knife into his heart—or maybe just his back—he threw his arms around him and kissed him right back. The roaring of waves giving way to the sound of his heartbeat fluttering in his ears.

Daryl’s legs were wobbly from the two-mile run he had done, but that didn’t keep him from going weak in the knees, lungs raging for air, but he told them to ‘fuck off.’ Nothing could tear his lips from Rick’s: not the horde closing in, nor possibility of getting struck by lightning.

Nothing but the brash booming of thunder that woke him.

“Should’ve fuckin’ known,” he groaned out in his drafty cell. He was back in the prison, the dreamworld and his dreamRick fading further into the haze of his subconscious. “Ain’t no fuckin’ beaches around here.”

But the adrenaline from the dream was still flowing through him full throttle, and in a fit of bravery—or extreme stupidity—he hopped out of bed and hightailed it to the guard tower where Rick was standing watch.

Daryl stormed the tower, hair soaked from the actual rain coming down to find Rick staring wide-eyed in front of him. But before he could talk himself out of it, and before he sobered up from the dream, he fused their lips together for real, for the first time, and maybe for the last.

He pulled away slightly, their chests heaving as they sucked in air. “Was better in my dream,” he mumbled and turned around, convinced he’d made a fucking fool of himself and half expecting for Rick to banish him from the ‘kingdom.’

That was until Rick replied with a gruff, “Mine too…but maybe we’re just out of practice.” 

Daryl swallowed as he turned back around, hoping that meant what he thought it did. Sure enough, Rick was grinning up a storm that rivaled the one burgeoning outside. And the bastard was right about them being out of practice because he swore the second kiss shook the whole Earth. 

But then again, maybe that had just been the thunder.


End file.
